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Other valuable preventives to consumption are fresh air and
sunlight and, as my predecessor remarked, there is not much use in
giving people windows if they do not open them. The value of
fresh air for consumptives has been preached in this Borough for
the last twenty years or more and we are now beginning to reap the
benefit by the great reduction in tuberculosis mortality. Of recent
years a valuable addition to fresh air has been found in sunlight and
it is quite evident from the interest which has been aroused by our
recent campaign, by our flying visit to Leysin and other places
where the sun treatment is carried on, and our sending six patients
to Leysin for the sun cure, that propaganda under this head is
going to do an enormous amount of good and it will not be long before
the masses are convinced that, in addition to refraining from spitting,
plenty of fresh air and sunlight will be of great personal advantage,
and will help to reduce still further the incidence of tuberculosis.
The whole then amounts to this—that for the prevention of tuberculosis
one must enlist the intelligent co-operation of not only the
patients but the general population. As far as surgical tuberculosis
is concerned, a large part of this can be prevented by propaganda
and this should be directed to make the public demand the best
class of milk not only from the chemical point of view but from
the point of view of the absence of bacillus, tuberculosis and other
harmful organisms.
In connection with this campaign, while the Borough Council
recognises that institutional treatment of tuberculosis is the duty
of the County Council, yet it is strongly of opinion that the sending
of the six patients to Switzerland has done more for sunlight propaganda
in Bermondsey almost than any other single measure.
In addition to sending the patients to Leysin, the Borough Council
has decided by resolution to carry out the following measures for
the prevention of tuberculosis which, as they are inextricably bound
up with the question of propaganda, may be mentioned here. Firstly,
negotiations are already taking place to obtain a piece of land about
three-quarters of an acre in extent, where it is proposed to erect a
solarium. This would consist of a wooden shed with a verandah